Drowning
by ThickerThanLove
Summary: This is based closely on a vision I had as a new Christian, as I struggled to overcome doubt. I hope it touches you as it touched me. Please R&R and may God bless you.


**Drowning**

Everyone has different spiritual gifts. I am still discovering mine. However, one I feel must be mine is the ability to see in my dreams my spiritual battles put into visions that I can better understand, better relate to. I am happy to say they come less and less as the Lord has filled my life, filled my heart and soul. However, one will forever stay with me. One that never fails to inspire me. In the many times doubt has felt like an endless sea to me, as I'm sure other children of God have felt. This is the story of my emergence from it.

There was no shore in sight. There was no star in the sky. Everything was dark, everything was cold, everything was frightening. I felt alone and abandoned. So much water all about me. How deep it was I don't know but I felt as if I were one of the passengers of the Titanic. Lost among an endless sea, with no hope of escape.

Then they came. Demons, servants of the dark one, the evil one. Tugging upon my hair, my arms and my legs. It pulled my body down to chest deep in the water. It hurt, it stung but most of all, it scared me. I couldn't see their faces but I could hear their shrill voices as plain as day. They screamed things at me I couldn't decipher and probably would never want to decipher. It mattered not that I couldn't make out their individual words. I knew the core of their message. They had planted the seed of doubt in me and now all they wanted to do was water it.

"Where's your proof?"

"Split the sea?"

"Raised from the dead?"

"Snatch people up in a Rapture?"

"Illogical."

"Impossible."

"A lie."

I wanted them to go away. I wanted them gone! I was so new at this and these attacks were getting worse and worse! I was sick of it! I wanted it ended! Why had I agreed to this? Why had I become a Christian? It was so hard! This was so hard! I wanted to be left alone! Before I was saved, I never got these attacks! If I was saved, why was I attacked so rapidly now?

How could this be worth it? HOW?

"It isn't…you're following a lie. You know it's impossible, illogical. A made up fairy tale."

Such a dark voice, so cold. Whether his words were that directly I cannot recall but the feeling was clear as day. It made sense. How could some invisible being split the sea? Create a baby that a virgin would give birth to? Cleanse sin from all who merely asked for forgiveness? Too easy… There were so many unanswered questions…

Wait…I'd been warned about this voice.

Satan…the Evil One. The eternal deceiver.

The water was up to my neck now. It was harder and harder to keep afloat. I was tired, I was exhausted. It would be so easy to just give this fight up. To give in. Oh, I just wanted relief, rest from this battle. I wanted these things to leave me be. If that meant letting them pull me under, fine. If they would finally be quiet…

No! No, I couldn't give in. I knew what waited if I did. But I wanted them gone, I wanted them quiet. I wanted out of this sea. I wanted out! I wanted a shore, a preserver, anything, anything whatsoever to keep me afloat, to give me relief from this struggle to stay above the sea. Oh, if God was truly loving, He would send me a relief.

_"You mean all I have to do to make them go away is say His name?"_

_ "Yep, that's all. They fear Him."_

My friend had told me that. My guiding light. The one who had led me to Christ. She had told me that when I asked her about the doubt before, when she had warned me that what I thought was logic was really the deceiver, trying to overcome me. He was trying to pull me back down from salvation.

Crinkled and wicked hands wrapped around the one arm I stretched up to the empty sky. With what little strength I had left, I screamed, fear, loss and desperation echoing,

"Lord Jesus, help me!"

If those voices had been yelling before, they screeched now but with a fear. I kept my eyes focused up, kicking with all my strength. I tried to keep my hand stretched upward, just pleading with my heart. I wanted to believe, I wanted salvation, I wanted to know. So badly, so terribly badly. I had felt the beautiful taste of the Holy Spirit. I didn't want to give it up.

So bright…

A bright light.

My eyes couldn't see the face but I knew who I was seeing. The demons tugging on my arm let go in horror. I stretched out an exhausted hand. Soft, strong fingers touched mine. They moved down, clasped hard around my elbow. There was a warm and beautiful light and aura about them. The sea slipped away from first my chest, then my waist. I felt the water drip off my legs as I was lifted up from it. Desperate claws clung to my legs and that dark voice screamed.

I was lifted away. The strong arms wrapped around me, one around my torso, the other under my legs, supporting me against the form's chest. I pressed my temple into the strong and warm chest. Tears of relief fell down my face. I looked down at the fading sea as I was lifted up, up, up, higher. That dark voice screamed, howled.

Then the figure that had pulled me out of the darkness spoke, so gentle to me but so firm and unyielding.

"She is no longer yours."

Thank you Christ Jesus. I laid my face into his chest. Thank you.

"I will never forsake you child. Never. You are my daughter."

Thank you…


End file.
